Silver got no love last week, suffering its worst week in 13 weeks, and raking up a fourth straight month of losses.
After losing US$1.35/t.oz between Sept. 13 and Sept. 18, the metal closed on Friday at US $22.38/t.oz. Before last week, silver had not traded sub-US $22.50/t.oz for the entire 2021. One would have to rewind their charts to November 2020 to find silver trading below US $22.50/t.oz.
The cause of silver’s unpopularity might be the signs indicating that the US economy is in decent shape, regardless of Delta variant fears. For one, Retail Sales in the US pleasantly surprised last week, rising 0.7% vs an expected decline of 0.8%. With positive signs radiating from US economic reports, the seriousness of talk concerning a Fed-taper heightens, and with that, a stronger USD, and less demand for metal hedging.
What we might expect of silver moving forward
We might be in uncharted territory here. At least according to a technical perspective and recent history. Silver has successfully defended the US $22.50/t.oz price level multiple times over the past 12 months. To find a closing price below this threshold, trek to July 2020, when silver closed at US $19.40 as it ascended for eight weeks straight, to seven-year highs, topping out right before US $30.00/t.oz.
Now that the closing spell has been broken, a new era of prices may be on the way for silver. Moving forward, don’t be surprised by a new range for silver between US $20.00/t.oz and US $22.50/t.oz leading up to an announcement from the Fed concerning a definite taper timeline. It is possible that the FOMC meeting, scheduled for this coming Thursday, followed by Fed Chair Powell’s speech on Friday, will be the events responsible for the metal’s next significant move.